Tuesday, June 7, 2011

RAAM Nutrition by the Numbers

They say it takes a village to accomplish great tasks. What I recently discovered is that it also takes an entire village's monthly food supply to fuel one RAAM rider for 8 days.

I put together my usual all-encompassing-race-nutrition-spreadsheet-from-hell and came up with my overall nutrition numbers for 8 days of racing based on my "typical" race requirements for cycling / per hour = 300 calories, 400mg sodium, 45 oz fluid.

Calories: 28,800 -- equivalent of putting on 8.2 pounds
Sodium (mg): 38,400 -- glad I have really low blood pressure
Hydration (oz): 4,320 -- 33 gallons

Did I mention this is only for WHILE I'M RIDING and doesn't include "off the bike" meals?

I laid out all my gels, bars, powders, chews, salt tablets and I stood back in awe of the massive pile on the kitchen counter top. I will be taking in 80% of my cycling calories in liquid form. To give another perspective, these calories include 115 scoops of powdered glucose (yum!) and 50 scoops of Hammer Perpetuem (both are essentially powdered calories added to water). And the Hammer Gels? Forget the individual packets. I bought multiple jugs.

At this point ultrarunner Dean Karnazes flashed through my mind and he may have had it right. When he would be on one of his epic training runs, he'd simply call a pizza place and tell them to deliver at an intersection that he would be running through. Then he'd simply take an entire pizza, roll it up burrito style, and enjoy. Maybe I need to rethink my nutrition strategy. Then again, do I really want to be tasting and re-tasting tomato sauce or cheese while I'm grinding my way up Wolf Creek Pass? Not so much.

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